Good that you've done coverage of this. It seems that the release of the Platform Update went mostly unannounced and not many news sites seem to have picked up on it.
A lot of people mistakenly think that DirectX 11 is only for Windows 7.
It's good that you're showing that it works just fine on Vista, and more importantly: that there's not really a performance difference between Vista and Windows 7 either (well, on my PC there is, but I have a 320 mb videocard, I think Windows 7 just saves a bit more memory. Probably doesn't matter with a 1 GB videocard).

With DirectX 11 available on Vista, I can now ditch my DirectX 10 code altogether. DirectX 11 runs on all hardware and all OSes that DirectX 10 does, and more. It also supports DirectX 9 hardware now (and the update also makes DX9 hardware available in DirectX 10, but what's the point? You need to rewrite your application to use it anyway, might aswell use DirectX 11). So I'm now down from supporting 3 APIs to only two: D3D9 and D3D11. D3D9 is just there for XP support now. With a bit of luck, Windows 7 will make XP nothing but a bad memory soon, and I can finally go back to supporting 1 API (and you can still run on the same hardware as XP does, a Pentium 4 or Athlon with an SM2.0 or SM3.0 videocard works fine with Windows 7 and DirectX 11). Reply

Those who currently use Vista and aren't fooled into believing 7 is better. There's mostly useless UI tweaks in 7 which can be an annoyance for those who are use to XP/Vista. The only people 'selling' 7 are those who get kickbacks from Microsoft. Both Vista and 7 suck, but if you're still using Vista there's no point in making M$ richer by paying twice for the same lousy OS. Go get Windowblinds 7 for Vista instead of funding Billy's pension. Reply

Win7 in my experience is too buggy still (does not know when to open start menu submenus, randomly opens on mouse hover, randomly on mouse click) and has almost no differences architecturally from Vista + DX11, and I don't care about its OS X Dock ripoff, if I wanted that I'd get a Mac a long time ago.

My Vista Ultimate x64 will serve for many years to come, I'm not going to use my Win7 Pro licence I got for cheap for a couple of years if not more.

mejobloggs is right, it's a waste of money to get Win7 if you have decent bug-free pretty well working Vista rig. I've got mine because I got huge corporate discount for my preorder, but I won't use it anyway, maybe in 2013 or so... or I'll skip to Win8 and sell my unused Win7 license then, hehe :P Reply

XP mode IS virtualPC, nutsack! But you wont have to use your (or buy a new) XP license for the extra bucks you spend on pro/ultimate edition. And you cant have this nifty seamless mode with just a XP in a virtualPC - only the XP mode does this.

XP-Mode is NOT virtual PC. Is a lightweight version of virtual PC. It will allow to use XP apps like it was 7 apps, but not to launch the XP OS in a window like the full Virtual PC does. It really brings down the need to do maintenance on another windows, but also will not allow any customization or tests. For instance, you can install and run really old apps or games in a Virtual PC, but will not be able to do so in XP-Mode. They are not the same thing, and many advanced users must be aware of this. XP-Mode is there to satisfy enterprise users.

FYIO, I use VMWare to run a bunch of virtual machines, from win2k to linux, and would never run XP-Mode to anything.

(in advance: I'm posting this just to talk about XP-mode, I'm not blaming anyone here, so please be polite if you decide to answer.) Reply

No offense, but please speak from your own experiences rather than second-hand information. Otherwise, it just sounds like you're "talking out of your ass."

You CAN run the XP OS in a window like the full Virtual PC.

In fact, XP Mode = Virtual PC + Integration.

I run Visual Studio 2008, Office 2003, and NetMeeting from the XP OS ITSELF in the guest XP OS. Of course they can also run from the Windows 7 Start Menu under Start -> All Programs -> Windows Virtual PC -> Windows XP Mode Applications -> whatever you have in the Windows XP GUEST'S start menu (for the most part).

However, if you are logged into the XP Guest, and you want to run an XP Mode app from the Windows 7 host, then it will log you out of the XP Mode guest (similar to using Remote Desktop to access a Windows XP PC). Reply

Your talking about the Compatibility Mode then, yes? (Right click an executable, select properties, chose Compatibility tab, pick a historical from Windows 95 up to Vista, etc...) That works OK in Seven.

The XP Mode is pretty sweet too. Compatibility mode is built-in, but XP Mode is not on the Windows 7 disk, you get it here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/downlo...">http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/downlo... as a separate download. XP Mode does require and launch a Virtual PC guest, but you don't have to run the whole desktop, you can run the app by itself! This version even plays nice with USB ports. I believe that apps have to be in the All Users Program Files Startup folder for them be available to run like that. But it's emulating a fairly low end AMD card, so it's not going to run DX11. Reply

I hope you at least use the XP Start menu. People who revert that for no particular reason should be shot. Having quick access to your most used programs eliminates much need for Taskbar space-eating QuickLaunch shortcuts. Reply

The classic start menu is way more functional and concise. Your point about "having quick access to your most used programs" isn't exclusive since you can easily do the same with the classic (it's just that almost everyone lacks the common sense to bring order to their menu).

A downside of the new menu is that you can't expand Control Panel or Network Connections.

You can have virtually the same "most used programs" functionality with the classic menu if you put shortcuts on the first layer, above "Programs". That method lets you control exactly what's there, and they will stay in the same spatial spot. Reply

Thanks for the link! but this is the redistributable EXE, and contains the DX for several languages. I don't believe it is necessary once you've done a correct update using WindowsUpdate site. And maybe this file also has DX9 for WinXP users inside it, because in the description it says it is for WinXP as well Win7.

I don't think you understand... It's not the same thing.
The redistributable contains all the versioned libraries, like d3dx9_nn.dll, d3dx10_nn.dll, d3dx11_nn.dll etc, with nn being the version number.

The update this blog refers to will just install d3d11.dll and related files, enabling DirectX 11 (which is NOT included with the runtime, else we'd have DX11 on Vista before this update). It doesn't include the runtime as far as I know. So if you had previously installed the runtime, you may have all the latest files for d3d9 and d3d10, but not d3d11 as it wasn't installed on your system yet. Reply

Do you mean the games perform the same under DX10/DX11 under the same settings or do you mean they perform the same with each being set at their highest settings, with DX11 having more eye candy and stuff? Reply

You missed the whole point of the article: They're testing DX11 on Vista. The comparison then is simply DX11 on 7 vs DX11 on Vista, and performance is equal; they also tossed in a DX10 title (Crysis) to ensure no DX10 performance has been lost with the DX11 update.
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No, I didn't lose my point. My question concerns whether or not the test setup, specifically the settings were kept the same or not for DX10/DX11 whether that be in Win7/Vista.

When someone says "They're testing DX11 on Vista," what settings are they comparing the DX10 counterpart to? Did any of the DX11 features get turn on and compared? Obviously this would be unfair as DX10 won't have the features.

Your question pointsa to the fact youhave no clue what your talking about..in fact it sounds as if you are trying to sound smart and all when infact the question is at best annoying and at worst ignorant. Reply

Your question is strange. Why would they test with different parameters? The game parameters are exactly the same under Vista or 7 since both platforms support the exact same DirectX features once Vista is updated to DX11. Reply